Chicago Bulls vs. Milwaukee Bucks Game Outlook: New Year’s Eve Game

The Chicago Bulls are coming off a tough loss in Indianapolis yesterday to the Pacers, let’s take a look at tonight’s matchup at the United Center with the visiting Milwaukee Bucks.

To say the Bulls’ season has been nothing short of a roller coaster ride would be an understatement. However, going into play today, Chicago is sitting at the bottom of the playoff race at 8th overall in the East.

Traditionally, the Bucks’ length has given the Bulls fits on both ends of the floor. In their last matchup just two weeks back, Milwaukee held Chicago to a season-low 32 second-half points. No that isn’t a typo, 32 points. The Bulls scored a measly 15 points in the third quarter, 17 in the fourth quarter and finished the contest with 69 points on 30 percent shooting from the field. Woof.

But the Bulls are coming into today with even more questions than answers, one being who will be their point guard moving forward. Head Coach Fred Hoiberg did not play current starting point guard Rajon Rondo a single second during the second half of last night’s loss to the Indiana Pacers. In fact, backup guard Michael Carter-Williams took a bulk of the time at point guard, scoring 12 points and pulling down eight rebounds in 27 minutes. Controversy is nothing new to Rondo’s career, but seeing it actually start to unfold in December is sooner than we all thought.

Hoiberg wants the ball pushed, and the younger Carter-Williams is doing just that. Maybe Hoiberg is giving Rondo the “Nikola Mirotic treatment” and taking him out of the rotation for a few games. Rondo’s glaring faults have been a lack of shooting and slowing the offense down. Not to mention his lack of on-the-ball-defense and ambition to win defensively. There’s no doubt his court vision is a plus, but in this offense, it just does not work. Is that Rondo’s fault? No.

Chicago’s front office knew what they were getting when they signed the 10-year veteran guard. And quite frankly, how often can you teach an old dog new tricks? What’s disappointing is they knew the scouting reports on him, and knew what kind of coach they have in place, but still rolled the dice.